‘Bloody hell. A child was murdered in broad daylight and nobody saw anything? And they blamed the woman?’

‘You have to wonder, don’t you? It did happen though. I checked the archives.’

The reservoir slid into view on our left. Black as ink, sucked into the base of the valley by the drought. The drowned villages weren’t visible, but I pictured them. The houses swallowed by the waters. Including the house where this poor murdered child and her mother had lived.

‘Is the Pale Child supposed to be the ghost of this dead girl?’ I asked.

‘Yes. After she died, the story goes that she haunted the big old house. But she was benign. She just wandered around asking for someone to look after her or be her friend.’

‘So what changed?’

‘It was after the reservoir was built. The house that the child haunted was flooded along with the rest of the village, so she lost her home and got more desperate for friends and for someone to look after her. That’s why, if she sees your face, she claims you. But you have to go and be with her on the other side.’

‘Blimey. Is this from your granny?’

‘Yes. I had tea with her earlier. She says the Pale Child appears in times of drought, like this year, where the water goes low and reveals the old house where she lived.’

‘Your gran’s like a one-woman historical society, isn’t she? We should get her to start a museum. With a tea room.’

‘She can’t remember where she left her glasses or whether she fed the cat, but she remembers all this stuff.’

‘So the Pale Child was a Nightingale?’ I said. ‘That would mean she really is related to Violet.’

‘I suppose so, yes.’

‘How strange.’

‘I hear Mandy Finchley’s panicking,’ Fiona said, ‘because Gary saw her too.’

‘Yes. If anything happens to him …’

‘Then we freak the hell out.’

I laughed and looked at Fiona. An image flitted into my mind. She and Craig at the briefing. The way they looked at each other. ‘Fiona, are you and Craig getting along okay? I mean, I know with Craig it’s never easy.’

Fiona hesitated and then spoke quickly. ‘We’re fine. Same as usual.’

‘Has anything happened?’

‘No, nothing. Honestly. I stand up to him more these days and he doesn’t like it. I had to toughen up when I was in charge of the tea-fund.’

‘Ah yes. The assertiveness boot camp that is the tea-fund.’

I wondered whether to persist. Things clearly weren’t fine. But if she refused to talk, there wasn’t much I could do.

‘We’re nearly there.’ Fiona pointed out a collection of buildings on our left. ‘I can’t quite believe what we’re here to see. I guess she’s hoping to show it’s not possible.’